Hopes that the US sanctions against Russia would be quickly rolled back when President Trump was elected in November didn’t pan out, and the latest comments from Secretary of State Rex Tillerson suggest that the administration has no intention of removing the sanctions at all.
Speaking with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko over the weekend, Tillerson reported told him that the US sanctions on Russia will remain wholly in place “until Russia returns control of the Crimean peninsula to Ukraine.” Needless to say, Russia isn’t going to do that.
Crimea was an autonomous oblast within Ukraine until 2014, when they held a referendum and seceded. After that secession, they sought and gained accession into the Russian Federation, which the US doesn’t recognize. US officials have repeatedly presented this as Russia “invading Crimea” or “taking Crimea by force,” though the peninsula’s ethnic Russian majority was able to effectively secede outright without anything nearly so dramatic happening.
Nobody seriously expects Russia to “give back” Crimea, even if there was a mechanism by which they could conceivably do so, which there isn’t. Conditioning sanctions relief on that is tantamount to announcing the sanctions as a permanent feature of US policy, a stance which will likely suit the many Russia hawks in Congress and across Western Europe quite well.
Any particular reason why Poro wants Crimea, or for that matter why the US wants Ukraine to have it?
Any good reason? Nope. All about the posturing.
My guess is that Poro wants at least one part of Ukraine to be successful and the US just wants war between Ukraine and Russia – much easier than trying to pull Ukraine out of the mud.
Crimea was historically part of Russia and is inhabited by Russian-speaking Russians who voted to join Russia. It’s called self-determination! Isn’t there some UN mechanism which could at least embarrass the White House on this, if not thwart them?
Historically Crimea was the hub of the Slavic slave trade. It wasn’t until Catherine the Great invaded Crimea that the slave trade was ended
Makes you think that Crimea was named as a derivative of crime or the criminality that was going on
“Crimea was historically part of Russia. . .”
Actually, the history of Crimea is very, very complicated. There have been successive occupations and ethnic cleansing by the Cimmerians, the Romans, the Bryzantines, the Mongols, the Venetians, the Ottomans, the Tartars, the Ukranians and the Russians and a number of other ethnicities. At various times Crimea has been part of the Russian empire and that many Russians settled there where they displaced other nationalities as recently as the expulsion of the Tartars in the1950’s. I don’t see Crimea as “historically part of Russia” anymore than I see Texas or Hawaii or Puerto Rico as historically a parts of the United States. All we can say is a majority of the people there today after Stalin exiled the Tartars whose ancestors sold Slavs as slaves (hence the word “slave”) voted that they would rather be a part of contemporary Russia than live under the current regime in Ukraine. I don’t like the pro-NATO fascists who control the Ukraine today so I support the right of Crimea to secede from Ukraine. But I leave it at that.
Crimea was part of Russia from George Washington to Dwight Eisenhower. The transfer of Crimea to Ukraine was a product of Khrushchev’s machinations, to which we are now unwitting advocates.
Why not let the Crimeans vote on it…oh, wait. Too democratic a solution I guess.
I thought they already did a couple years ago
They did vote to be annexed by Russia.
Not really. The election was a total farce.
Not at all, almost all the adults voted in the referendum and many polls were taken after by polling organizations in the west and east and they all came up with the same result, almost unanimous preference to be part of Russia again. It was more far than any US election…ever.
You mean, they voted to REJOIN Russia.
There, fixed it for ya.
I’m calling for sanctions on the United States until they return Texas to Mexico!!
The irony of Americans who are on their high horse about ‘restoring Crimea’ is that Crimea declared independence in 1991 only to be annexed by Ukraine in 1995, http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2017/03/28/so-who-annexed-crimea-peninsular-then.html
The average fool in the U.S. probably thinks that the Russians rolled tanks into Crimea in 2014 like the Soviets did in Hungary or Czechoslovakia during the Cold War.
Hey, Mr. Tillerson! How can you be so stupid? Crimea declared its independence in 1991, only to be illegally annexed by Ukraine four years later. Hello?!! The only reason Crimea didn’t rejoin Russia back then had to do with Boris Yeltsin, who was a puppet of the Oligarchs who wanted Crimea to be part of Ukraine.
Crimea successfully seceded from Ukraine and rejoined Russia in 2014 in a REFERENDUM, Mr. Tillerson. Russia did NOT annex the Peninsula .. even though it had its Black Sea Fleet anchored at the port of Sevastopol for over 200 years .. it welcomed Crimea with open arms. You didn’t watch videos of ecstatic Crimea’s inhabitants celebrating their reunion with Russia with immense joy, did you? Do us a favor, stop lying about Crimea’s reunion with Russia and read the true history about that region.
Thank you, Chris, for enlightening us on this matter:-)
Exactly, Crimea voted in favor of autonomy in 1991 which Kiev said no but Crimea still acted autonomously until finally 2014 they successfully seceded.
It will be interesting to see how Russia routes around all of this. Sanctions don’t work in the long run. They just create more middlemen. I would suspect that this will prompt China, Russia and Iran, and their trading partners, to make good on their threats to come up with alternative financial clearinghouses.
Sanction have worked just fine in forcing other countries to stop using the dollar . Which in the end will hurt us more than them .
This belligerent a-hole is going to get us in a real war. Thanks, Donald.
The new objective of the Trump administration is to make the Black Sea a NATO lake. How is that different from Clinton and even Sanders?
Trump and Tillerson Both look more like globalists after the election
Russia uses the Black Sea as a naval base. One ship sunk in the channel at Istanbul and nothing moves.
Tillerson is really pathetic.
I’m still trying to figure out whether Trump is an idiot or just pretending to be an idiot in order to be unpredictable. Or maybe those, like me, who voted for him are the idiots.
Don’t beat yourself up about it. You chose the “lesser of two evils”, remember?
Until the American people have the right to select, “None of the Above” on a State or federal election ballot and be counted against the other candidates/incumbent, nothing will ever change for the better.
U.S. out of Hawaii..!
How did the GANGSTERS in WASHINGTON..
Obtain Hawaii..?
The U.S. stole it..
of course..
Sent battleships to Honolulu..
Threatening to blow it up..!
Made the Queen a deal she couldn’t refuse..
They’re Gangsters..what do you expect..?
Ask the Hawaiians how they feel about.
They’ll tell you it’s a Military Occupation..!
The beautiful paradise of Hawaii.
Pearl of the Pacific…
Turned into an Aircraft Carrier
Poised to attack Asia.
Beauty…
( divinity..the divinity of Nature )
Deformed
to meet the needs of the NarcoTerrorists
from Washington who hold the entire world hostage.
Like most people in Hawaii..
I say the US should get the fux out of Hawaii
( give it back to it’s rightful owners)
AND END THE MILITARY OCCUPATION.
SELF DETERMINATION FOR HAWAII..!
Brad, I second the motion. Give Hawaii back its independence and end its military occupation. The USG has NO right to demand Russia to “return” Crimea to the Zionist country of Ukraine, while it still holds Hawaii against that island’s will.
Back in the latter 18th Century, the British Empire tried to do the same in the personage of Captain Cook, who had discovered the Hawaiian Islands in one of his voyages in the Pacific Ocean.
BTW..
Importantly,
Some of the Gangsters battleships sailed in from Manila..
Where just previously,
The Philippines had gotten rid of the Spanish..
Only to be conquered by the United States.
Historians estimate the US
murdered around 200,000 or 300,000
Philippinos suppressing the revolution.
Russia will voluntarily return the Crimea and the Russian citizens living in Crimea to the new Nazi Ukrainian government after the United states returns Alaska to Russia for the price they sold it to us for .and returns the Louisiana purchase to France
Which will be, of course, never, Eric. I like that statement, since it’s actually true. Russia will only return Crimea and the Russian citizens living in it to the new Zionist Ukrainian gov’t. after the USA returns Alaska to Russia for the price they sold it to us, and returns the Louisiana purchase to France.
We all know that will NEVER happen in a thousand years.
But the people of Crimea voted in favor of Russian annexation of their land. It was their wish that they wanted to be under Russian governance.
silly rabbit, the Empire doesn’t care what people think.
“a stance which will likely suit the many Russia hawks in Congress and across Western Europe quite well”
It suits the Russia Is Coming crowd, but nobody else. Europe is being hurt by sanctions much more than the US, and the US is being hurt too.
Meanwhile, Russia is developing the more diversified economy they should have been doing all along instead of exporting raw materials and importing finished goods as they were. We are forcing reforms on them that backfire on our purposes in the long run.
This takes the heat of Trump for his supposed Putin ties, but it otherwise not helpful.
The sanctions have been very helpful to Russia’s agricultural sector, and
go a long way in building up their self-sufficiency in many areas. More than a few countries’ populations would love to self-sanction themselves out of this globalist bankopoly mess.
Dear Rex: You are hopelessly misinformed.
This article does a good job explaining the absurdity of the US position on Crimea:
http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2017/03/28/so-who-annexed-crimea-peninsular-then.html
Tillerson, you’re a world class retard! You willfully ignore that FACT that the Crimea voted “by over 90%” to leave the Ukraine and rejoin Russia!
Russia took NOTHING! STUPIDITY OF THIS MAGNATUDE SHOULD BE A CRIME
Exactly. You hear that, Tillerson? You’re a world class retard. You willfully ignored the FACT that Crimea’s electorate voted by 97% to secede from the Ukraine and rejoin Russia! Russia took absolutely nothing, but welcomed Crimea with open arms! What part of that don’t you understand, Tillerson? Why don’t you resign? Never mind your wife .. You said you didn’t want this job as SecState; so do us a big favor and resign, then.
Actually, when the people voted it was for deciding what to do with their already decided independence. There were two choices on the ballot, remain independent(as Nazis were mounting an invasion force vowing to kill all Russian speakers in the region), or to ask to rejoin Russia. The 93% who wanted to join Russia won, but the remaining 7 % were favoring independent state status with close ties and economic aid/protection from Russia. They ALL wanted to disconnect from Kiev.
That was already done by the Crimea Parliament a week and a half before the referendum. If Russia was to “give” Crimea to anyone it would be to the Crimeans who were already independent.
You’re in for a long wait sh*t-head.
Tillerson is another sell out to the zionist neocon fascist cabal, Trump duped “We the People” when he campaigned on America First, it turned out zionist IsraHell first and their foreign agenda.
LOL, Russia ain’t ever returning Crimea you old goat f*ck Tillerson. The people of Crimea voted overwhelmingly to secede from Kiev to once again be a part of mother Russia. Why doesn’t Tillerson tell Poroshenko that he needs to step down and allow the former President to resume office because the U.S. doesn’t tolerate democratic govts to be overthrown, LOL.
I do think that the hell will freezes over, before that happen ??
A US Naval Base in Sevastopol ?? Wet Hollywood dream !
My
theory is that the rump of Mrs. Clinton’s defeated coterie have so
effectively gummed up the works of government that the Trump
Administration has to concede these things if it wishes to profiteer at
all.
That is, there’s power still to be had in opposition,
and that power, rather than being directed toward things like Universal
Health Care, reduction of wealth inequality, or environmental
sustainability, is going to fan the flames of war in Syria, and exclude
Russia from international commerce. Were this to be true, it would not be something you could lay on Trump’s doorstep, but rather Hillary’s — meaning the DNC leadership still in her sway.
And
while this policy development is rightly to be feared, it may not yet
be upon us, in fact, almost certainly is not. If Trump remains true to
form, he will hedge on this, and there will be some feints before we get
a final policy.
Notice that the source is what
Tillerson reportedly said to a Ukrainian bureaucrat. Who did the telling
is not mentioned, nor any other details that would allow confirmation
or encourage credulity. One suspects Mr. Ditz if he is not living up to
his name with this one, is either chumming for clicks or honing his
chops as a disinformation specialist.